Engineer Harmony: Save Time and Money by Reducing Conflict Part 1: 4 Steps to A Stronger Emotional Stance By Darrell Becker

Every day is a chance to see clearly, to build effectively, to reduce unwanted friction internally and externally. That’s the ideal option, just breezing through life, waltzing through a cloud of satisfied encounters, making objectives, taking effective actions which achieve those objectives, feeling like a god or goddess walking upon a world that is perfectly home to you.

This is an essay to help gain some of that feeling, for the purpose of creating a strong emotional stance, making it less likely that exterior events will create internal emotions that render you less creative, less resilient, less flexible and less powerful. Think of the stance of someone who is unbalanced. If you visualize them, you can see that they might easily topple over with the smallest of external events.

Think of someone who is trained in the martial arts. You can visualize them as being able to withstand tremendous external pressures and impacts and stay balanced. The bulk of what I’m writing to you are parts of the mental, emotional, organizational and action-based methods I have studied, practiced and innovated into several techniques which I hope you can use to gain a stronger balance, and to be better able to handle external situations with more of your skills left intact. This is Part 1:

Emotional Harmony in 4 Steps.

Step 1: Take in all your observations, the important ones. Review them, and review the thoughts you are having, including judgments, evaluations, and assessments.

Example: The guy I hired to build the software has just emailed me that I gave him a bunch of requirements rather late into the project, making it necessary to start (again?) from the beginning, and he is demanding money to pay for his time he spends redoing the code. He seemed angry, used many technical terms that had to be looked up, and he kept emailing and texting with often the same message for 3 days.

Step 2: Notice all and any of your primary and secondary emotions.

Example: Anger, frustration, (New Thoughts include: fear of the project slowing down, fear having to talk to the CFO about my budget, I’m disappointed that I didn’t know from the beginning how pricey it would be if I tried to add things late into the project.)

Step 3: Here is the equation, solve for X.

Observations (what a video camera would take in) filters through
X (X = Values, Desires, Needs, Motives)
Observations are changed by X, the abstract qualities which motivate all of our thoughts and feelings.
Feelings and thoughts happen, to indicate what X is.
Find each relevant X using this list:

Example: I wanted ease, efficiency, harmony, clear communication. I wanted affordability, each of which connected to my observations, my thoughts and my feelings listed above.

Step 4: I visualize the next moment I will be achieving ease, efficiency, harmony, clear communication and affordability.

Example: I picture myself going on a walk, feeling the ease and harmony. I picture myself facilitating a meeting, creating clear communication. I picture myself participating in the local and free workouts which are provided in my neighborhood, and I can savor the quality of affordability.

I return from the visualization, and I assess my thoughts and feelings. Did I effectively create more internal harmony, emotionally speaking? If so, then it might be time to return to the tasks at hand, including the situation with the software developer, the need for the project to be completed within the assigned budget and timeline, and the need to find and create solutions to these and other types of obstacles between myself and a harmonious existence. If I didn’t effectively achieve greater balance and harmony inside myself, I have a chance of trying again, or seeing if I can acquire help from professionals or friendly networks of associates who have solved problems similar to my own.

This is a beginner version of a method that becomes far more extensive in our online courses and webinars. Please check out Part 2 and Part 3 to see more ways you can achieve harmony, internally and interpersonally. Wishing you well on your journey to harmonious achievement.